Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes • Hacker News Board

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#741

Post by sooheon » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:17 AM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #105

"We" don't ignore them. Every major government has a body dedicated entirely to automobile safety. In the USA, this is NHSTA - National Highway Safety & Transportation Administration. They maintain an information system of traffic fatality statistics in the USA, called FARS (fatality analysis reporting system). This system is used to determine new safety devices and standards for vehicles and to test their effectiven…

This is like an oil company spending a lot on oil spill cleanup. Or saying we have a very well appointed water bucket brigade to clear water from a ship with a giant hole in the side.

When you believe car centric development is harmful to its core, it's poor consolation that we're spending even more ineffectual resources on top of that to try to curtail the harms.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#742

Post by tablespoon » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:17 AM UTC

AlwaysRock wrote: post #702

PebblesRox wrote: post #543

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is mandatory but not everyone follows the rules. Our car has been hit three times in the past 4-5 years and only one of the drivers was insured. (One didn’t even have a license!)

Yup. Two times our car got hit the driver ran and left no note. Its fucked because then we pay the $750 deductible. Cops dont even try to find who did it. Really frustrating.

> Yup. Two times our car got hit the driver ran and left no note. Its fucked because then we pay the $750 deductible. Cops dont even try to find who did it. Really frustrating.

If you're complaining about the driver not leaving a note, that implies no one you know was there with your car to witness your crash. How do you expect the cops to even try to find out who did it? Go full CSI?

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#743

Post by treeman79 » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:17 AM UTC

kieselguhr_kid wrote: post #157

treeman79 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn’t San Fransisco do all of those? They spend a huge amount on it anyway. And being one the dirtiest cities possible.

No city can adequately fund these programs, and San Francisco certainly doesn't build housing for the homeless, have an enlightened drugs policy or have adequate mental health care. San Francisco and other coastal cities mainly differentiate their policies by treating the homeless populations there with malignant neglect instead of outright hostility, which leads to the phenomenon you see where 10-12 cities bear the…

https://www.hoover.org/research/only-san-francisco-61000-ten...

Spending for homeless is 61,000 per person

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#744

Post by Cupertino95014 » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:18 AM UTC

> For auto crashes, we’re talking about block level interventions, the kind of fine-grained design details that transportation departments are not able to perform.

An assumption that's nowhere even stated, let alone supported: that auto crashes are amenable to highway engineering changes. Why is "reckless driving" dismissed as obviously wrong?

> They need to recognize that the growing crash fatality rates are a direct challenge—even a rebuke—to their theory of traffic safety,

excuse me: growing crash fatality rates?? Shouldn't he at least demonstrate that they ARE growing?

As maerF0x0 demonstrates below, they are NOT growing, and roads and cars are certainly WAY safer than they were 50 years ago.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#745

Post by xputer » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:20 AM UTC

havblue wrote: post #729

So how much of this increase is because of increase in car weight and how much is it "road rage" or whatever you want to call it? I definitely have noticed more aggressive drinking post covid and I hear about it more. Even a gas station worker mentioned randomly to me how people in our city are crazy drivers. This is anecdotal but I've become more worried about driving with the family.

Both are definitely a factor, but don't forget that a lot of the irritate driving behavior is because in America people are forced to drive. Even if they don't want to or really shouldn't be driving, they still have to drive to get around town. Here is a video that explains it further:

https://youtu.be/d8RRE2rDw4k

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#746

Post by lelandbatey » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:21 AM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #693

MichaelCollins wrote: post #625

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We also mark deadly intersections and turns with white crosses, one for each person who's died there. They're worth paying attention to, and I think locals at least learn to be weary of those locations.

I was at a community meeting where they debated removing all such crosses. They were triggering PTSD for people involved in the crashes. Most accidents occur close to home. Imagine a survivor having to drive past such a cross every day. I don't know on which side I land on the issue. For safety, the crosses should probably be placed far ahead of the dangerous corner, not distracting drivers at the precise point they…

One would hope that such crosses instead prompt folks to change such intersections so that they will prompt fewer deaths. Maybe then we can have a rule: if we rebuild the road and we see a drop in deaths, then maybe we can remove the sign with crosses. Better yet, replace the intersection with a bus-only, bicycle-only, or rail as public transit, and then that set of crosses is permanently retired.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#747

Post by sooheon » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:24 AM UTC

notch656a wrote: post #518

magicalhippo wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still, it's an order of magnitude above what we see in Norway for example, around 12 per 100k population vs around 1.8 per 100k population. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in... https://www.ssb.no/transport-og-reiseliv/landtransport/stati... (car fatalities) https://www.ssb.no/befolkning/folketall/statistikk/befolknin... (population)

Fatalities are more usefully measured per mile not per person. For instance, in many 3rd world countries the roads are notoriously unsafe but the average person covers few enough miles that their road fatality rate per capital looks better. Note this applies to OP posted above you as well.

No, I'm pretty sure it makes more sense to measure deaths per capita. If poor urban planning made people's commutes 2x longer, would it suddenly be half as bad for someone to die?

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#748

Post by jedimastert » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:34 AM UTC

theptip wrote: post #255

> It is widely recognized that there is an epidemic of suicides among current and former military personnel, especially those who have been on active duty in a combat theater... There were 3,481 combat deaths in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Since 9/11, there have been over 30,000 military suicides. Over 20 soldiers a day take their own lives. Pet peeve: while I really like the general point of the article, I wish the aut…

> Using those numbers suggests that 10k of those suicides quoted above were specifically attributable to military service (and 20k would be "baseline civilian risk of suicide").

This would be the case if probability of joining the military was independent of the risk factors for suicide, which I seriously doubt.

Not disagreeing with the point at large, just that the statistical analysis would be even more complicated, at least finding similar demographics between the two populations

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#749

Post by gfaster » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:35 AM UTC

autoexec wrote: post #623

dcsommer wrote: post #594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US has this concept of "black spots" too. However, they are ironically named "safety corridors." We get a nice sign [0] to mark the death zone and then traffic continues unabated. [0] https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2010/04/inflated_traffic...

I had assumed that every city I've ever lived in was doing the rest of the work too, sending out engineers to asses the reasons for the higher than average deaths and making changes like adding stop lights, clearing anything obstructing people's view, or adjusting speed limits. Seems defeatist (or more cynically, exploitative) to just throw up a sign and extract more money from speeders. I mean, I want to know when I…

Worth noting that up to a point, removing obstructions makes roads more dangerous. When the street is a complex environment with many obstructions, trees, and/or points of conflict, people drive slow because it feels dangerous to go fast and are therefore less likely to kill or maim.

The most dangerous roadways are what Strong Towns (article source) refers to as a stroad, which are characterized by many, wide lanes, with frequent turnoffs and other points of conflict. They make drivers feel safe, and so they go fast (regardless of speed limit) and kill people. There is a lot more nuance there that is valuable to learn about, but at the moment, it is really difficult to build safe streets, and even fix unsafe streets, in North America.

Re: Why we ignore thousands of daily car crashes

#750

Post by dev_tty01 » Fri, Jul 22, 2022, 4:38 AM UTC

nightfly wrote: post #630

MichaelCollins wrote: post #596

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The disasters that happen when nuclear energy fails are amazingly bad though. Even discounting immediate human deaths, Are you sure you're not discounting that figure because it's contrary to your conclusion? Very few people have ever died as the indirect long-term result (let alone by direct immediate result) of nuclear energy accidents, even according the highest estimates from histrionic ideologues like Greenpea…

I'm overall not anti-nuclear or anything. The lasting cultural, ecological, and economic damage from severe nuclear disasters is _pretty_ significant though and we need to do a better job ensuring they don't happen if we wanna restore peoples trust in the idea of nuclear power.

Better job? How many people have died due to nuclear energy accidents? If you consider deaths per megawatt, or most any other standard, the nuclear agencies are doing a fantastic job. How low does the risk have to be?

The relative risk of nuclear to coal is unbelievably low yet there is still this irrational ability to weigh risk/reward benefits correctly.